What would you do?

[jsmob]

Hello every one.
 I have a bit of an emergency.
 I had four hives. I put sugar boards on two of them. I believe the rain leaked in and just got the whole hive soaked. Anyway one hive has already died out. But the second one I acutely found the queen and maybe a half dozen bees still alive. They are very weak, (slow moving) and probably will not make it.
 But what I was thinking on doing is going to my other two hives and seeing if I can take a frame of open brood each, with the nurse bees, and put them in a cardboard nuc box that I have to see if I can save her.
 Dose this sound like the right thing to do? What would you do? Temps have been in the 60s
Thanks for the help.

[iddee]

Beekeeping is full of opinions, but I wouldn't gamble losing a good hive for a queen that has already been chilled. If it were March, maybe, but Jan, I don't think it is worth it.

You may well be buying a replacement package for the one you take frames from, as well as the two that you have lost now.

[tlynn]

Similar to a situation I just had, though a bit different.  I had a failing queen in a hive and requeened in December.  Folks at the bee club said I'd probably lose the hive.  Sorry, not happening.   I added 1 brood and nurse bees and shrunk it to a nuc.  Temps after the changes had been in 70s and 80s so I wasn't too concerned about temperature at the time.  Looking at Sacramento weather, your temps are running close to ours right now.  On the recommendation of others here, I got a terrarium heater for it.  It's a 16 W "Reptitherm" under tank heater.  It was $35 at Petsmart.  Size was perfect for nuc.  Nuc has SBB and I put it under the hive and set hive on plywood.  I ran a test with the 8W and it didn't make much difference in an unpopulated nuc.  I switched it for the 16W one, and it kept temps in the low 70s in the hive on a 45 degree night, so I knew it won't cook bees.  Then I rotated out the 8 W one with the 16 W one and returned the 8W.  I think it's just enough to keep the edge off based on our temp spread here.

[rdy-b]

Are you saying that the hives with the sugar boards are the ones that failed-maybe those two should have been combined for a larger mass of bees to cluster-hope the other two pull through this winter has been mild -but we are not out of the woods yet -good luck  RDY-B

[kathyp]

you are probably almost through your winter.  some cold nights still, but warmer days.  used to live down that way. 

you'll proably lose her, but you could take 1 frame of brood and shake some workers in from each of your strong hives.  if nothing else, you'll have something going for next month when your queens start laying well and you can swipe another frame or two of brood and let them requeen.  you'll have your nuc and a spare queen in case you need her, or you can expand and start another hive.  just don't make your strong hives weak.